I have a "template" virtual machine that I maintain (OSX Server, running in VMWare Fusion). It runs on 5 different machines at the same time. When I want to make a change, I change the base VM, and I make copies for the 5 machines.

After booting one of the copies, I always have to do some manual postprocessing in the VM: - change the hostname to a unique name - change some configfiles of an application on the VM to have a unique name - tell timemachine it doesn't need to backup my drive (somehow copying of the vm makes timemachine ask this again)

I would like to automate these tasks. Ideally I would like to create a unique name based on the name of the VM host.

How do I most conveniently remove these manual tasks from my deployment process?